YOU ONLY LIVE TWICE

YOU ONLY LIVE TWICE (1967). Director: Lewis Gilbert.

The film version of Fleming’s novel hasn’t got a whole lot to do with the book, although it does retain the Japanese setting and the master villain is still Blofeld. The character of "Tiger" Tanaka (head of the Japanese Secret Service) is also carried over from the book, as is the Ama diving girl called Kissy (the sexy Mie Hama). In this new storyline Blofeld is using his own spaceship to hijack manned rockets out of orbit, hoping to cause a war between the Russians and the Americans. Inexplicably Bond’s death is arranged and announced and he is even buried at sea amidst headlines, but this whole business seems contrived merely to fit in with the film’s title. You Only Live Twice is highly entertaining and has top-notch production values, including Freddie Young’s striking cinematography, Ken Adam’s stunning production design, and pretty sharp editing by second unit director Peter Hunt (who would helm a Bond feature himself in the future). This is a very well-made movie. Even the models and miniatures (copters, space ships, buildings, volcanoes) seem more like something out of the 80's than the 60's.

Highlights include the plane trap that horny Bond is suckered into by Helga Brandt (aka No. 11), played by lusciously sinister Karin Dor; the attack on the mini-copter "Little Nelly" by big copters that seem like malevolent dragonflies; and the poison-on-a-thread business that inadvertently kills Aki (Akiko Wakabayashi) when Bond himself was the target. There’s a scene with piranha in the novel – in the film Blofeld sends No. 11 into a pool full of them because she failed to kill Bond. Blofeld was behind the scenes in two previous Bond movies (From Russia with Love and Thunderball) and Bond finally meets him face to face in this entry, with Donald Pleasance properly weird and sinister (perhaps a little too weird) as Blofeld. Charles Gray, who plays the murdered Dikki Henderson in this film, would play Blofeld in Diamonds are Forever. Although the word S.P.E.C.T.R.E. is never mentioned, one imagines that Blofeld would need the services of that group to pull off this caper, and he is still referred to as "Number One." (Spectre was also mentioned in the film version of Dr. No, although not in the novel, as the group did not exist before Fleming wrote Thunderball.)

Roald Dahl’s screenplay is lively, and there are plenty of memorable action scenes and fisticuffs. The sexism involving the geisha girls and the Japanese opinion of women is so outrageous that it’s almost comical. This reaches its nadir when Tanaka tells Bond that as cover he must marry a woman with "a face like a pig." As he waits by the altar, two supposedly "homely" women approach, but the third, who is beautiful, of course, turns out to be the bride. Tanaka tells Bond that the geisha girls are fascinated by his hairy chest. "Japanese men have beautiful bare skin," he tells Bond. Bond replies, "Bird never make nest in bare tree." Sean Connery, giving his usual slick one-dimensional performance, is unconvincing as a Japanese – at his height (6 ft. 2), it’s a wonder they even bothered with the deception (even in the novel this aspect seems foolish). John Barry’s music is, as usual, excellent, with a compelling theme song sung competently by Nancy Sinatra. Lewis Gilbert directs with aplomb. [Question: Are the American astronauts still on Blofeld’s ship when Bond blows it up? This seems unclear.] The next Bond movie was On Her Majesty’s Secret Service; Majesty was actually published before You Only Live Twice, which served as a sequel to that book. The same cannot be said for the film versions, of course.

Verdict: Good show, 007! ***.

ON HER MAJESTY'S SECRET SERVICE

ON HER MAJESTY’S SECRET SERVICE (1969). Director: Peter Hunt.

After meeting a beautiful, troubled woman named Tracy (Diana Rigg) and her handsome criminal father Draco (Gabriele Ferzetti), Bond uses info he acquires from Draco to track down Ernest Stavros Blofeld (Telly Savalas), who is using beautiful women with allergies in another massive extortion plot. Since Blofeld hopes the College of Arms will declare him a count, Bond goes in disguise as someone from the college to Blofeld’s Swiss HQ and tries to figure out what he’s up to. Richard Maibaum’s script is relatively faithful to Ian Fleming’s novel, although there are a few changes. It makes no sense that Draco’s men should seemingly try to kill either Tracy or Bond in the prologue and other sequences. In the novel, the men are simply trying to escort the two of them to Draco and Bond misunderstands.

Although double entendres had been part of the Bond movies (if not the novels) for years, Maibaum’s script seems unnecessarily smarmy at times. A stupid aspect is the way Bond allegedly pretends to be gay when he impersonates Sir Hilary Bray (from the College of Arms), although this comes out more in some dialogue than in Lazenby’s performance – he seems foppish, stuffy, a bit of a "sissy," perhaps, but not stereotypically "gay." (The real Sir Hilary is a bit foppish but not epicene -- and not a gay character. And most gay men are not foppish or effeminate in any case.) In Fleming’s novel Bond simply observes that there’s no reason why a nobleman, whom he’s impersonating, can’t be down-to-earth, and decides to pretty much act like himself. When 007, disguised as Sir Hilary, interacts with the ladies he meets at Blofeld’s in the film he is perfectly charming with them and even flirts with one of them, Ruby. (Ruby writes her room number on his thigh in lipstick and he returns from her room after an assignation with a lipstick kiss on his cheek.) Yet one gal observes "I know what he’s allergic to," and even Ruby – pre-assignation – says "You’re funny – pretending you don’t like girls." Huh? This just doesn’t come off. Americans may think that men with upper class British accents sound effeminate, but why would British girls think the same? When he pretends to be Bray, 007 doesn't sound any more affected than Prince Charles! (Lazenby is dubbed by the actor portraying Bray during these scenes.)

Maibaum adds some good scenes as well as bad ones: Bond kisses Miss Moneypenny on the lips, (if not with great passion) and she’s seen crying at his wedding. When Bond goes to pay another call on Ruby, he finds the formidable Irma Bunt, Blofeld’s assistant, in her bed! In the novel, Bond and Blofeld had never come face to face before, but everyone connected with the film forgot that the two men met in the previous Bond movie You Only Live Twice -- yet Blofeld doesn’t recognize Bond (he figures it out because of a mistake Bond makes – as well as 007's sheer horniness.) While it may be "tame" by today’s standards, the scene when an agent pursuing Bond and Tracy gets chewed up by a snow blower (in the novel he ran into a train) turned a few stomachs in 1969 and (even if it was a bad guy) was considered in bad taste for an escapist film. George Lazenby may not be a great actor, but he isn’t at all bad as Bond. He may in general lack the wry, raised-eyebrow insouciance of Sean Connery, but he can be gruff and athletic when he needs to be, as well as light and charming when required. Considering he practically had to carry the whole film on his shoulders with relatively little experience, he acquits himself quite nicely. Diana Rigg is as lovely and professional as ever as Tracy. Although her part was beefed up a bit from the novel, it is still very much a supporting role at best. Telly Savalas makes a wonderful, smooth, urbane and virile Blofeld, although he doesn’t exude too much personal menace – he won’t kill you with his bare hands but will certainly watch with glee as somebody else does it for him. Gabriele Ferzetti is perfect as Draco.

On Her Majesty’s Secret Service is ultimately a mediocre Bond outing, unfortunately. Michael Reed's cinematography is second-rate, and director Peter Hunt covers the action without much cinematic elan. The film is better edited (by John Glen, who would himself direct some Bond features and was second unit director for this picture) than directed, as witnessed by the film’s greatest sequence: the battle between Bond and Blofeld as they careen down the icy, slithering bobsled run. This superb, breathlessly paced, and brilliantly executed sequence remains one of the best action scenes in any Bond movie. If only the overlong picture had more scenes like it. There is no opening theme song for the movie, although later in the film Louis Armstrong croaks out a rendition of the pleasant "All the Time in the World" by John Barry (who did the score, as usual) and Hal David. NOTE: To read a review of Ian Fleming's novel, click here. 

Verdict: Great bobsled sequence! **1/2.